Homemakers must regularly clean and change the sheets and linens on the beds in their homes, a task that necessarily involves repetitive lifting and manipulating a heavy, bulky mattress during the bed making process. Most homemakers, both young and old, find that lifting a heavy mattress with one hand and positioning the sheets and blankets with the other hand is next to impossible unless they have help. Even with two persons working together, making a bed is a strenuous task.
Likewise, hotel housekeepers at hotels, motels and inns must routinely change the linen on many beds every day. The stress and strain associated with the repetitive lifting of heavy mattresses during the bed making process eventually takes a toll on the worker in the form of lifting injuries, work loss, and even workman's compensation insurance claims in the case of commercial establishments.
In prior art, Fairchild et al. in U.S. Pat. No. 6,795,989 B2 teaches the use of an inflatable air bladder to raise a mattress from the box springs. Further, Fairchild teaches that the mattress and air bladder are connected together with “fasteners” at specific locations “adjacent to each of the corners of the bladder”. However, using fasteners of any kind to lock the mattress to the air bladder interferes with the bed making task.
The “fasteners” are designed to secure the air bladder to cooperating fasteners on the overlying mattress. The problem is that when air bladder fasteners are secured to the cooperative fasteners on the mattress, it is not possible to place (“tuck in”) the bed linen and blankets between the air bladder and the overlying mattress. In other words the “prescribed” fasteners make it virtually impossible to slide (position) linen between the mattress and the air bladder.
Further, Fairchild et al. teaches the need for an opening that “comprises a needle valve extending through the surface of said bladder.” Fairchild et al. also teach an air bladder being of an X-shape, I-shape or H-shape configuration. The specific shape designation is stipulated so that the . . . “volume of air required to inflate said bladder is minimized.”
The prior art of Yamaguchi in U.S. Pat. No. 5,257,430 also provides an inflatable air bladder for raising a mattress. Yamaguchi teaches various sizes and shapes of air mattresses. The one constant that is present in all of Yamaguchi's designs is that there is a plurality of inflatable members connected to non-inflatable members. This is quite different from the present invention.
In order to maximize the benefits of raising a mattress to an optimal work level, to eliminate all the heavy lifting and minimize bending and kneeling, the ideal bed making apparatus must provide a means to secure (“tuck in”) the top sheet and blankets under the mattress while the mattress is positioned at the optimal work level by the inflated air bladder.
Both Fairchild and Yamaguchi focus on raising the mattress to eliminate strenuous lifting; however, both designs fail to provide an efficient means to secure the clean linen and blankets between the mattress and inflated air bladder. As a result both patents require the operator to lower the mattress onto the box springs before the linen and blankets can be properly secured. At this point the operator must resort to strenuous lifting and bending to complete the bed making task. The obvious problem is that lowering the mattress in order to secure the linen and blankets defeats the purpose and negates the important benefits of raising the mattress on an air bladder in the first place. With the present invention, the sheets and blankets can be easily positioned and secured under the mattress while the mattress is held at the optimal level by the inflated air bladder.
Thus, it would be advantageous if there were an apparatus, like the present invention, which (1) elevates the mattress throughout the bed making task, and (2) provides a means to conveniently secure the bed linen and blankets under the mattress while the mattress is still supported at an optimal work level by the inflated air bladder. Such an apparatus ensures that the bed making task can be completed while the mattress is raised to an optimal work level. In most cases, a well designed apparatus also enables a single person to do the job by himself/herself without the need for an assistant.